one of my favorite gals in the world, miss nell, was commenting on facebook how the Christmas season is so new and fresh for her this year with her baby boy making her look at the Babe in the manger with her new mama eyes.
when she mentioned feeling so overwhelmed experiencing Christmas as a mother, i recalled the final haunting lines from this luci shaw poem, mary's song, and looked up the rest of the poem to share with her online. and so i thought i would share it with all of you. it is a lovely example of what poetry does.. makes you look at something from a different angle. and rocks your world...
Mary's Song
Blue homespun and the bend of my breast
keep warm this small hot naked star
fallen to my arms. (Rest ...
you who have had so far
to come.) Now nearness satisfies
the body of God sweetly. Quiet he lies
whose vigour hurled
a universe. He sleeps
whose eyelids have not closed before.
His breath (so slight it seems
no breath at all) once ruffled the dark deeps
to sprout a world.
Charmed by dove's voices, the whisper of straw,
he dreams,
hearing no music from his other spheres.
Breath, mouth, ears, eyes
he is curtailed
who overflowed all skies,
all years.
Older than eternity, now he
is new. Now native to earth as I am, nailed
to my poor planet, caught that I might be free,
blind in my womb to know my darkness ended,
brought to this birth
for me to be new-born,
and for him to see me mended
I must see him torn.
"for Him to see me mended i must see Him torn."
those were the words that i remembered from the poem.
being a mother costs so much.
life costs so much.
love costs so much.
grace costs so much.
christa wells says this about her beautiful song "life costs so much"...
It’s about…the very tangible torment He opened Himself to repair the damage we’d done. The great personal price He accepted to resurrect us. How free is Grace?
Someone paid for the damage…
Tim Keller points out that if someone backs out of your drive, running into your gate and garden wall, there are real, actual damages that must be paid in order to restore the gate and wall. “Either you or he absorbs the cost for the deed, but the debt does not somehow vanish into thin air. Forgiveness, in this illustration, means bearing the cost for his misdeed yourself.”
And the Father told us all of it long ago. He told us we were dead, reminded that dead people can’t raise themselves up. That resurrection would be a critical heart of the plan.
Dry bones, breath breathed, open graves, dead brought to life, Lazarus, Christ himself, our own future…the imagery is pervasive and effective in Old and New Testaments.
Ezekial 37: They say, “Our bones are dried up and our hope is gone; we are cut off.” Therefore prophesy and say to them: I will bring you back to the land of Israel. Then you, my people, will know that I am the LORD, when I open your graves and bring you up from them. I will put my Spirit in you and you will live…
How else do you explain all these open graves we’ve got?
How do we explain it? Joy in emptiness? How do you explain the forgiveness of deep offenses? Peace in tempest winds? How do we explain the always-returning green hope buds of this Life?
Someone must have paid…